Thread: The Centre introduced a new land acquisition law in 2013 to protect the rights of land owners. But three states—K'taka, Maharashtra & TN—continued to use archaic state laws to acquire land for high-profile projects. How did they do this? Read on. (1/16)
In 2013, the Congress-led UPA government introduced the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement (LARR) Act. The Act provides better compensation to land owners and makes it mandatory to seek their consent before acquiring their land. (2/16)
Land acquisition is a ‘Concurrent List’ subject under the Constitution, which means both the Centre and states can pass their own laws. However, all state laws on land acquisition became null and void the moment the LARR Act was passed. (3/16)
Some of the state laws were as old as 50 years and were similar to the provisions of the Land Acquisition Act, 1894, under which landowners had little or no say in the land acquisition or compensation. (4/16)
A few states, such as Gujarat, Jharkhand, Telangana and Andhra Pradesh, tried to dilute the LARR Act by removing some of its provisions (5/16)
Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra, on the other hand, blatantly ignored the LARR Act and continued to use their state laws to acquire land for high-profile projects, including the world’s largest oil refinery in Maharashtra and the Chennai Metro Rail project. (6/16)
For example, the Karnataka government used the Karnataka Industrial Areas Development (KIAD) Act, 1966, to acquire land. Under this Act, the state can declare any piece of land as an industrial area and acquire it irrespective of landowners’ consent. (7/16)
This is in stark contrast to the LARR Act, which mandates the consent of at least 70% of the project-affected people if the land is to be acquired by a private firm or for a private-public project. (8/16)
Maharashtra inserted a section in the LARR Act to exempt four state laws from its provisions. These enabled land acquisition for industries, highways, housing and town planning. (9/16)
In 2017, Maharashtra attempted to use the Maharashtra Industrial Development Act to acquire land for the world’s largest oil refinery. The acquisition was eventually scrapped due to large-scale protests by the affected people. (10/16)
In February 2014, just a month after the LARR Act came into force, Tamil Nadu passed an amendment that said the provisions of the LARR Act ‘would not apply’ to three state laws governing land acquisition-for industries, highways and land redistribution to Dalits. (11/16)
Acquisition under these three state laws accounts for three-fourths of all land acquisitions in Tamil Nadu, according to a study by the Centre for Science and Environment, a Delhi-based think-tank. (12/16)
By 2018, nearly 150 petitions were filed in the Madras High Court against the use of state laws for land acquisition. The petitioners included a wide range of people-from farmers to city dwellers-affected by the state’s amendment to the LARR Act. (13/16)
On July 3, 2019, the Madras High Court struck down Tamil Nadu's amendment to the LARR Act. It ruled that the state laws became invalid the day the LARR Act was passed. (14/16)
The judgement has been hailed by land rights activists as a precedent for challenging the amendments made to the LARR Act by Maharashtra. A case on Karnataka’s amendments is already pending in court. (15/16)
State officials from Maharashtra and Karnataka, however, have said that they would continue to use the outdated state laws despite the Madras High Court judgement. Read more: indiaspend.com/how-maharashtr… (16/16)
